Bruins: As expected, Boston mostly quiet at opening of NHL free agency period

By Mike Loftus, @MLoftus_Ledger

Monday

Jul 1, 2019 at 8:13 PMJul 1, 2019 at 8:13 PM

BOSTON — Another year, another July 1 in the shallow end of the free agent pool.

The Bruins, who added four players who cost them under $8 million last season, were even more frugal during Monday's annual free agent signing period. They didn’t retain their two primary unrestricted free agents, and added two NHLers for less than $2 million.

“We don’t foresee any problems reaching deals with players, depending on the terms.”

Agreeing to those terms with McAvoy and Carlo, two young, Top Four defensemen, and versatile winger Heinen, who has salary arbitration rights, now becomes the Bruins’ primary summer project. Once Monday’s dust settled, the Bruins had about $10 million remaining under the NHL’s $81.5 million salary ceiling for 2019-20.

They’d started the day with closer to $12 million, which still wasn’t enough for them to make a firm offer to Johansson, the winger obtained from the New Jersey Devils at the NHL trade deadline last February whose solid playoff performance (4-7—11 over 22 games) came in the final year of a contract that paid $4.6 million annually.

Johansson hadn’t found a new home by early Monday evening, but had priced himself out of the Bruins’ range, as Sweeney didn’t even extend an offer.

Acciari did have offers from the Bruins before his contract expired, but apparently nothing equal to the three-year, $5 million offer he accepted from the Florida Panthers.

“I think there’s always a breaking point,” Sweeney said, “and we got to a point (with Acciari) where I felt that we needed to head in a different direction.”

The departure of Acciari, who became a valuable, physical member of the Bruins’ fourth line over the last two season, wasn’t entirely unexpected. He registered 16 goals, 25 points and almost 400 hits over the past two seasons, earning $725,000 each year.

The Bruins, however, established something of a precedent last July 1, when Tim Schaller, who had produced 12 goals and 22 points in 2017-18 as a fourth-liner earning a bargain-basement $775,000, wasn’t prevented from leaving for Vancouver, which offered him $1.9 million per season for two years.

Ritchie came in at a term and price point more in line with what the B’s established last year when they signed fourth-liners Joakim Nordstrom ($1 million) and Chris Wagner ($1.25 million), who both reach unrestricted free agent status in a year.

Ritchie also brings some of the physicality Acciari takes to Florida. He ranked second on the Dallas Stars in hits in 2016-17 and 2017-18, and was fifth last year, when he played only 53 games.

Ritchie, 6-foot-4, 220 pounds, falls under the category of players who probably need a change of scenery. He thrived under coach Lindy Ruff in 2016-17, when he scored a career-high 16 goals, but he dropped to seven the next season under Ken Hitchcock in 2017-18, before plunging last year under first-year head coach Jim Montgomery.

Lindholm, who spent four seasons in Sweden before he felt he was ready to give the NHL a try, signed a one-year deal with the Toronto Maple Leafs and produced one goal and 12 assists over 61 games before he was traded to the Winnipeg Jets at the NHL deadline.

Lindholm got into only four games in Winnipeg, contributing one assist. His addition gives the B’s a second left-hand shot to take faceoffs — fourth-liner Sean Kuraly was the only lefty center on the roster last season.

The Bruins did address a couple of lower-profile restricted free agents Monday.

Defenseman Connor Clifton’s contract was extended for three years ($1 million per season) past the coming year, when he’ll make $725,000, and forward Ryan Fitzgerald got a new one-year, two-way contract.

In addition, the Bruins added forward Brendance Gaunce and goalie Maxime Lagace on one-year, two-way contracts, while defenseman Josiah Didier signed a one-year deal to play at AHL Providence.

Center Jordan Szwarz (Ottawa) and goalie Zane McIntyre (Vancouver), mainstays with the P-Bruins for the last three and four years, respectively, left the organization as unrestricted free agents.

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